Spare and Be Spared
by AceTrainerLeo
Summary: Frisk is only doing what she has to. It's not her fault every monster in the underground wants her dead simply for being human. Originally based off the comic "Is This Bravery." Cover image from said comic.
1. Oneshot: Epiphany

**I do not own Undertale. If I did, then why would I be writing fanfiction about it?**

 **This is based off the Deviantart comic Is This Bravery by zarla.**

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 **Welcome to my first complete multi-part fanfic! This started off as a one-shot, so the first chapter stands on its own. If you aren't a fan of later chapters (not that I blame you) then for all intents and purposes you can treat this first chapter as a complete story with an open ending.**

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The dust was turning Frisk's footprints black as she continued on past the now-empty Snowdin. She looked back, almost but not quite feeling regret for how that dust got there in the first place. _I'm only doing what I have to do,_ she reasoned. _I'm only defending myself. Given what happened between humans and monsters, you can hardly blame me, right?_

When Frisk fell into the underground just a day earlier, she had already learned the hard way that trusting people is usually going to get you hurt. This point was driven home even further after being on the wrong end of one of Flowey's "friendliness pellets."

 _Why would anyone pass up an opportunity like this?_

Flowey was completely right, Frisk realized. Monsters would have every reason to hate humans after getting stuck under Mt. Ebott for who knows how long. Almost every monster she'd come across through the ruins had immediately tried to kill her for no reason other than that she was human- and she responded in that most human of instincts, self-preservation.

Not that she was particularly happy about it, mind you. But she wasn't completely broken up about it either. When she saw that first Froggit dissolve into dust, she was understandably shocked, but she noticed to her own discomfort that it was getting easier. The toy knife she found in the ruins wasn't the best weapon ever ( _Where are the real knives, anyway?_ ) but she surprised herself at how easily she was able to turn it into something deadly.

 _It's not my fault,_ she reasoned with herself again, _that everyone I've met wants me dead._

Toriel had seemed genuinely kind to her, she would admit. But Flowey's words rung in her mind every time she found herself trusting the motherly goat. She really wanted to trust her, too. She did save her from Flowey, didn't she? Not to mention, that butterscotch-cinnamon pie was absolutely heavenly. However, she couldn't shake the feeling that something was very wrong. All those children's shoes in various sizes in the spare bedroom, Toriel brushing off every attempt to ask about how to leave the Ruins, her refusal to let Frisk anywhere near the basement... she got more and more paranoid the longer she stayed there.

Frisk's life on the surface wasn't ideal. Far from it, actually. But it certainly beat having to deal with threats to her life every waking minute. She wanted out. And for all she knew, the seemingly friendly goat lady could just be fattening her up to eat her one day. Toriel attempting to destroy the exit was the last straw. Frisk wanted to go home.

So, she did what she had to.

It was after she left the ruins that she met Lazy Bones (Frisk shuddered. Those puns are rubbing off on her.) and the Skeletor Cosplayer. Papyrus, it seemed, was the inverse of Toriel. Where Toriel acted motherly and kind but almost certainly had an ulterior motive, Papyrus wouldn't shut up about capturing the human, but was clearly an innocent kid at heart.

 _Doesn't matter how friendly he is. He's trying to get me killed._

Sans, meanwhile, was far harder to pin down. He was certainly more laid-back than his brother, but he did threaten Frisk with a vague "bad time." So he'd have to be eliminated too, eventually.

But first things first- the skeleton who was actively trying to capture her.

"HALT, HUMAN!"

 _Ah, speak of the devil._ There was a thick fog, so she could only make out his silhouette, but the silhouette was enough. She hadn't told anyone her name, and it was hard to determine her gender at a glance, so of course Papyrus would call her that. Frisk brandished her knife- it was mere muscle memory at this point. She instinctively moved forward for the kill.

"HEY, QUIT MOVING WHILE I'M TALKING TO YOU! I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, HAVE SOME THINGS TO SAY."

Frisk didn't drop her stance. _Chances are, he's trying to get my guard down._

"FIRST: YOU'RE A FREAKING WEIRDO!"

 _Um... okay. That was not what I was expecting, but whatever, I guess I'll humor him._

"NOT ONLY DO YOU NOT LIKE PUZZLES, BUT THE WAY YOU SHAMBLE ABOUT FROM PLACE TO PLACE... THE WAY YOUR HANDS ARE COVERED IN DUSTY POWDER... IT FEELS... LIKE YOUR LIFE IS GOING DOWN A DANGEROUS PATH."

 _No more dangerous than doing nothing and letting you all kill me._

"HOWEVER!"

 _Aaaaand here it comes._

"I, PAPYRUS, SEE GREAT POTENTIAL WITHIN YOU!"

Frisk blinked. _What?_

"EVERYONE CAN BE A GREAT PERSON IF THEY TRY! AND ME, I HARDLY HAVE TO TRY AT ALL! NYEH HEH HEH HEH!"

Frisk rolled her eyes. She took another step forward.

"HEY! QUIT MOVING!" Papyrus seemed more annoyed than afraid for his life. "THIS IS EXACTLY WHAT I'M TALKING ABOUT!"

Frisk stopped. She wasn't sure why. She felt the odd need to hear him out.

"HUMAN! I THINK YOU ARE IN NEED OF GUIDANCE! SOMEONE NEEDS TO KEEP YOU ON THE STRAIGHT AND NARROW! BUT WORRY NOT... I, PAPYRUS, WILL GLADLY BE YOUR FRIEND AND TUTOR!"

Papyrus continued speaking, but she wasn't listening. She didn't know what to make of it. _Keep me on the straight and narrow...? What's he going on about? I'm not doing anything wr-_

That's when it hit her. In an instant, Frisk realized just what she must look like to the other monsters. One day, something- not just anything, but a human- shows up in the ruins and starts plowing their way towards civilization, leaving a trail of dust in its wake. The monsters probably told ghost stories about humans- monster kids were probably afraid of humans under their beds. And now here was one- just as horrifying and deadly as they had been made out to be.

Frisk wasn't a bad kid. Far from it, actually. She was a good student, stayed out of trouble, and was generally nice to people (until she realized being nice is more trouble than it's worth, anyway). But now she was among people who feared her and eyed her with suspicion- and she had given them every reason to.

They weren't attacking her out of hate, like she previously thought.

They were attacking her out of _fear_.

All she had to do was let them know she didn't want to hurt them any more than they were already hurt. It actually seemed like not all of the monsters realized she was human- did she really need to kill them too?

She was snapped out of her epiphany by the realization that Papyrus had stopped talking and was not holding his hands out in an unmistakable gesture of... surrender?

 _No. Not surrender,_ she realized. The fog had cleared enough for her to get a look at his face, which despite being nothing but a skull, radiated gentleness and kindness.

 _Papyrus is sparing you._

The knife fell from Frisk's numb fingers, landing in the snow with a soft _fwump._

 _I'm a murderer,_ Frisk realized dumbly.

Papyrus didn't seem to notice the absolutely dumbfounded, horrified look on her face, but he did evidently see the knife drop from her hand. "YOU DID IT! YOU DIDN'T DO A VIOLENCE!"

 _I actually have to be congratulated for not killing someone._ Frisk felt her eyes well up with tears. She didn't bother holding them back. She didn't see the point.

 _I'm a murderer._

Frisk dropped to her knees. Her legs felt the freezing cold immediately- in hindsight she really should've grabbed some long pants on her way out of Toriel's place- but she pushed it aside for the time being. Actually, the memory of the kindly old goat monster upset her even more. She probably was being sincere after all. Toriel had saved her life, made her the most delicious food she had ever had in her life... and Frisk killed her.

She killed all those monsters.

 _I'm nothing but a cold-blooded murderer._

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Sans showed up a few minutes later, completely out of breath. Once he realized Papyrus was going to try to talk down the human, he couldn't afford not to care anymore. His brother was cheerfully marching to his own death.

So, being the dutiful brother he was, Sans ran as fast as his slippers would allow him to. He ran towards the exit of town, towards the place he saw the human disappear into earlier. He desperately hoped he wasn't too late as he picked up the pace.

He was bracing himself for the sight of a pile of dust with a red scarf lying on top of it. As such, was completely unprepared for the sight that met his eyes instead.

"I DID IT, SANS!" Papyrus cried out as he stood, holding Frisk in his arms. Frisk was covering her face, sobbing. Papyrus, meanwhile, had tengible excitement in his voice. "I GOT THEM TO LISTEN! IT WAS REALLY SCARY, I ADMIT, BUT I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, WAS ABLE TO... UM... SANS?"

Papyrus's voice died down once he realized Sans was shaking. Sans was feeling equal parts shock and relief that his brother was even alive, and it was hard for him to hold back tears.

"BROTHER? ARE YOU OKAY?"

Sans sniffed. "never better." Normally he would've found a way to work a pun into that response somehow, but he was too floored with emotion. "can i talk to the kid for a sec?"

"OF COURSE!" Papyrus replied, going right back to his original cheeriness.

Sans walked up to Frisk, who didn't seem to have heard the exchange. She was still crying.

"kid?" Sans prodded. "i, uh, didn't think you had it in you... but, um, i really appreciate what you just did. or didn't do, as the case may be."

Frisk opened her puffy red eyes, tears still running down her cheeks.

"I... am... so sorry," Frisk stammered out between sobs.

Sans recoiled a bit. He had never once heard her speak since they first met. He managed to keep his expression the same (which wasn't hard, since he was a skeleton and didn't have any facial muscles), so his surprise didn't really show.

"I'm sorry," Frisk choked out again, a bit clearer this time. She buried her face in her long striped sleeves again. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry..."

Sans tried to lighten the mood a bit. "it's all right, kid. i mean, better late than never, am i right?" He chuckled at himself. He knew it was bad form for a comedian to laugh at his own jokes. He didn't care. "you didn't hurt my brother, so you can't be all bad."

If Frisk heard him, she didn't show it. She was still muttering "I'm sorry" over and over again, her throat getting a little dry. Now that she had gotten a bit quieter, Papyrus set her back down on the ground, so now she was standing up again.

Finally she summoned the determination to look Sans in the eyesockets. "What are y-you still doing here?" Frisk glanced back at the toy knife laying in the snow. "I-I-I'm a murderer..."

Sans sighed. "listen, kid. you done goofed. i get that. but if you're really as evil as you say, you wouldn't be out here crying like this."

Frisk sniffed again. Now that she had some semblance of composure, Frisk was able to speak a bit more clearly. "I didn't want to kill anyone. But... what that flower told me... kill or be killed... I- I felt like I had no choice..."

Sans flinched. He knew very well what flower she was talking about. Thanks to the lab accident that removed Gaster from existence, he'd been forced to keep all his memories of the previous timeline every time that smug little thing pulled a Reset. But, for the sake of the kid's fragile psyche, he didn't say anything.

He realized that the old lady on the other side of the locked door was probably also dead because of this kid. But seeing her like this made him realize something else.

Sans still had a promise to keep.

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 **Thanks for reading, everyone. Feel free to let me know how I did. This is my first attempt at both an Undertale story, and my first fanfic in years. I haven't written a serious story in quite some time.**

 **Basically, this story contains my interpretation of Genocide!Frisk. (And yes, I personally see Frisk as female. If you disagree, full power to you, and I'm sorry if I offended anyone.) Basically, no one comes to Mt. Ebott for a happy reason, and that would also apply to Frisk. I'd imagine she has enormous trust issues, and she'd instantly buy into Flowey's kill or be killed philosophy. So she'd justify it as self defense, with a little prodding from Chara. Once she realizes what she's doing (if she ever does) and figures out how to reset, she goes back and fixes her mistake. Assuming Chara doesn't assume direct control, anyway.**

 **But again, that's just my interpretation. As a silent protagonist, Frisk is bound to get a ton of that. Hope you liked it!**


	2. Chapter 2: Surrender

**Surprise! Another chapter in a story I originally meant to be a one-shot!**

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It was nighttime in Snowdin. How anyone could tell it was night was anybody's guess. But it was night nonetheless. If they were on the surface, it would have no doubt been raining heavily. However, here in Snowdin, the weather was instead a blizzard. Gave off a pretty similar mood.

The real reason for the melancholy atmosphere was Frisk. The human child with the purple and blue striped sweater had just caused more suffering in two days than any monster had ever managed in their entire lifetime. And she was only now realizing it.

Frisk barely acknowledged the plate of spaghetti in front of her. Her hand holding the fork was shaking uncontrollably. She hadn't said a word since the two skeletons brought her into their house. Sans was keeping a close eyesocket on the kid. After all, promise to the woman behind the door or not, this was still the one responsible for killing hundreds of innocent monsters. All the same, however, Sans felt a little bit of pity. The kid was definitely not pleased with herself.

"HUMAN!" Papyrus said. "YOU HAVE YET TO EVEN TOUCH YOUR SPAGHETTI!" If Frisk heard him, she didn't show it. She was too deep in thought. Before Papyrus offered to make dinner, she had Sans tell the story of the Monsters from their point of view. The tale had survived in legends down to Frisk, but she wanted to know both sides. She learned about how Asriel, the king's son, befriended a human who fell down long ago, and how both of them tragically died on the same day.

Frisk hadn't said a word since and Sans was starting to get worried.

Finally, she spoke up.

"Papyrus? You said you were trying to be part of the Royal Guard, right?"

"YES INDEED, HUMAN! I CAN FEEL IN MY BONES THAT THE DAY I OFFICIALLY JOIN IS CLOSE AT HAND!" Papyrus seemed completely oblivious to what happened the previous day. "ALL I NEED TO DO IS TO CAPTURE A HUMA-"

Papyrus froze. He went slightly pale, which considering he was nothing but bones, was quite impressive. "Oh." Papyrus said uncharacteristically quietly, upon suddenly remembering why they were here.

"And the king wants the human souls to break the barrier, right?" Frisk prodded.

Sans' fake smile grew even faker. _where are you going with this, kid?_

"Y-YES HE DOES. WHY?"

Sans had a sneaking suspicion he knew what the kid was going to say.

"Because I'm going to let him take mine."

The silence was so thick you could cut it with the toy knife that Frisk left out in the snow.

"kid, think about this," Sans said faux-friendly like.

"Oh, I did." Frisk was unnaturally calm now. "I've caused you all so much pain these past couple of days. And now I want to make it up to you."

Frisk stood up and continued talking. "From what I read back in the ruins, and what I read here in Snowdin, you monsters are all so much nicer than any of the humans I've known. You deserve to be on the surface more than we do."

Sans' expression got serious. "kid, i know what you're thinking. but if you think i'm going to just sit back and let you walk to your death-"

"How do you plan on explaining this to... Undyne, was it?" Frisk interrupted. "That is the name of the captain of the guard, right? I killed those dog soldier guys on the way here. Undyne's definitely figured out I'm here."

She turned to Papyrus. "I want you to hand me over to her. Say that you captured me. I get punished, you get your dream, monsters get to leave the Underground, everybody wins."

Sans' eyesocket twitched. "you don't."

"Who cares?!" Frisk shouted emphatically before collecting herself. She sighed. "If you're not going to turn me over to her, I'm going to turn myself in."

Sans was getting frustrated, not to mention concerned. This was definitely not the voice of a 12-year-old. "no way, kid."

Papyrus seemed to agree with his brother. "HUMAN, DON'T DO THIS. WE GOT OFF TO A ROCKY START, BUT I THINK WE CAN BE REALLY GOOD FRIENDS. THAT'S WHY I WANT TO BE A ROYAL GUARDSMAN- TO HAVE FRIENDS. AND IF I HAVE TO GIVE UP MY FRIEND TO JOIN-"

"We are not friends," Frisk interrupted. "I was literally 2 seconds away from killing you. I'm a menace to everyone here. I've made up my mind."

Sans had just about had enough. "kid, i promised someone i'd look after you. i hate making promises, but that was the one i considered worth keeping."

"Even though I killed her?"

Sans stopped dead in his tracks. He knew that lady was probably one of the kid's first victims. He just didn't want to be the one to say it. He gave a distant stare to Frisk. This wasn't the voice of a 12-year-old, he thought to himself again. This is the sound of someone who is completely broken, someone who grew up way faster than she should have.

Now he saw it. When she killed those monsters, she was determined to make it out alive.

But now that determination was replaced with something else. Determined to fix her mistakes.

"It's not like we have a choice anyhow," Frisk started again. "Undyne is probably on her way here as we speak."

"WE SHALL THINK OF SOMETHING, HUMAN. UNTIL THEN, YOU ARE NOT LEAVING THIS HOUSE, AND THAT IS FINA-" Papyrus was cut short, and Sans' nonexistent blood ran cold, when Frisk suddenly whipped out a knife from the silverware drawer.

A real knife.

Sans almost whipped out a Gaster Blaster and atomized her right then and there, he was so shocked.

Frisk's expression remained the same. Neutral, distant, and unreadable. "You see? You _are_ still scared of me." She lowered her knife hand, holding the offending piece of cutlery at her side. "I don't want to use this. I really don't. But it's either you turn me in, or I do. I'd rather you did it."

The three of them stood silently for what seemed like an eternity.

Then Papyrus's phone rang.

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Undyne was equal parts furious and afraid. Afraid for the safety of her underling, furious that the human had been allowed to go unchecked for so long. She lost contact with all the canine units stationed near Snowdin. Papyrus was the last line of defense before that… that _thing_ entered Waterfall. Papyrus hadn't called in yet, which was out of character for the skeleton.

 _That could mean a lot of things_ , Undyne reassured herself. Unfortunately, she couldn't think of any scenarios that didn't end up with him being shredded into smiling ribbons.

There was only one thing left to try. She pulled out her phone and dialed Papyrus's number. _I really need to see Alphy about getting speed dial on this thing,_ she mentally added as the phone started dialing.

The first ring went by. Then the second.

By the third ring, Undyne knew something was wrong. Papyrus always answered by the second ring.

By the fourth ring she was starting to hyperventilate.

Then after the fifth ring, she heard a sound that she never thought she'd be so relieved to hear.

"HELLO, UNDYNE?"

She breathed a sigh of relief as her heart rate returned to normal. He was alive. He sounded less enthusiastic than usual, but she chalked that up to the human menace. Of course Papyrus would be a bit distraught. Speaking of which…

"Papyrus, what's the situation with the human? Can you give me a full report? Do I need to come down to Snowdin?"

There was a pause. Undyne was a bit confused- Papyrus never missed a beat when responding.

"THE HUMAN IS HERE IN OUR CUSTODY."

Undyne was stunned. _He actually did it?!_ She knew how tough Papyrus was, but never thought he actually had it in him to capture a human, let alone one as dangerous as this one.

"That- That's incredible news, Papyrus!" she responded finally, with childlike anticipation tangible in her voice. "What happened? How did the fight go? Did you kill it? Do you already have its soul?"

Papyrus's response was a bit shaky, but Undyne was so elated that she didn't notice. "NO, THE HUMAN IS STILL ALIVE. HOWEVER, I HAVE MADE CERTAIN THAT THEY WILL NOT HURT ANOTHER..." he paused. Undyne raised an eyebrow at the hesitation. Then her eyebrows both shot up in surprise at what he said next.

"THE HUMAN WANTS TO SPEAK TO YOU."

Undyne had no idea what to think or how to respond. _What is that human up to,_ she wondered. _No matter what it tries, I've almost made it to Snowdin. Even if it escapes from Papyrus, it'll be no match for me._ "Fine. Let's hear it," she answered in the most strained voice you ever heard.

"ONE MOMENT." The sound of the phone being handed to someone.

Then Undyne heard the child's voice for the first time.

"Hello. You're Undyne, right?"

Undyne was a bit startled that this was the voice of a child on the other end. She had heard the human described as being small, but she never actually thought...

She shook her head. _Doesn't matter how old it is. It's still a murderer._ "Why does it matter, you little brat?" She responded harshly. "In a few minutes, your soul will be ours."

"Before you do anything, I want to ask you something," the kid said, unperturbed. "Do you guys do last requests in the underground?"

Undyne blinked. She supposed she should've anticipated a question like that. "Yeah. Sure," she growled. "Since you asked nicely, I guess I'll ask what exactly you want, because it won't change the fact that you'll be dead soon."

"I'm aware. I won't delay it long, I assure you. My last request… is that I want the king to take my soul personally."

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 **I hope you enjoyed the far overdue second chapter.**

 **I wrote this second chapter because I have a strange fascination with the emotion of guilt, and not only facing the consequences of their actions, but embracing them. I rarely ever see fics where Frisk abandons the Genocide Route midway. Also, I wanted to write a Genocide fanfic where Chara isn't directly involved.**

 **In case you're wondering how Frisk knew that Toriel was the one Sans made the promise to, Frisk just guessed, since Toriel is the only monster who would care enough to make him promise that. The only evidence she really had was the jokes she saw in Toriel's journal.**

 **Stay tuned for next chapter, in which Undyne's escort mission begins without a hitch... but doesn't stay smooth for long.**


	3. Omake and Author's Note

**Hey y'all. I wanted to be serious here for a moment, but just so you don't feel gipped out of an actual update, here's an omake chapter for you.**

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OMAKE 1: ALAS, POOR PAPYRUS

Sans was running as fast as he could through the deserted Snowdin. Every second he wasted, Papyrus was getting closer to death. He considered taking a shortcut, but with how much focus was required to use those things, and how stressed he was now, he ran the risk of splattering himself across space-time. So he had no choice but to hoof it.

He hoped, prayed to whoever would listen that his brother would still be alive. Maybe the human would see reason. Papyrus didn't have it in him to stop the human himself. He didn't care what happened as long as Papyrus was okay.

And he was okay. Sort of.

"SANS!"

Sans was incredibly relieved to hear his brother's voice. But then he got closer and beheld the most jarring sight that ever met his eye sockets.

 _what._

The human child was standing next to a pile of bones that were starting to turn to dust, with a red scarf lying atop them. However, the child was holding Papyrus's skull which seemed none the worse for wear.

"IT WOULD APPEAR THAT I AM MOSTLY FINE! ...ALTHOUGH I MUST CONFESS, I SEEM TO BE IN A BIT OF A PREDICAMENT."

Sans was a little comforted that Papyrus… well, some of him anyway… was still alive and just as upbeat as ever. But he didn't feel confident enough to make a "nothing to lose your head over" pun.

He turned his attention to the human child, who was holding his brother's head. The kid was shaking uncontrollably and on the verge of tears.

Suddenly, without pausing, the kid started freaking out. "Saaans you've gotta help me I was going to kill him but then in the middle of stabbing him I changed my mind but my hand slipped and the knife flew into him and now his body fell apart and he's a severed head and the head is still talking AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DOOOO!"

Sans could just stand there and take it all in.

 _this is why i don't make promises._

* * *

 **I always figured that since the head sticks around for a little bit, it could survive on its own if Frisk doesn't do anything else. Hence, this.**

 **Anyway. *serious face***

 **You ever have that moment where you end something on a cliffhanger, then think "ah crap, I actually have to follow it up now" and have no idea what to do next? That was me posting chapter 2.**

 **I was originally going to leave well enough alone, but I had the idea for Frisk surrendering herself to Undyne after abandoning the Genocide Route and it would. Not. Leave. My. Head. But the thing is, I ended it where I did because I had no idea what to do with it.**

 **I have a general idea for how I want the story to go, but in addition to my sporadic schedule for writing and posting, I probably won't be able to update consistently.**

 **Should I continue with this timeline or should I just have Frisk reset and do the Pacifist route with her guilt?**

 **EDIT: You know what? You have to do the Neutral Route before you can get the True Pacifist Ending anyway. So eh, might as well see where this train leads.**


	4. Chapter 3: Escort

**In accordance with fanfic law, I must remind you I do not own Undertale, which is property of Toby Fox.**

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*RING*

*RING*

"Hey. This is the Hotland Royal Guard."

"Guys, this is Captain Undyne."

"Oh hey, Undyne! How did the, you know… the Snowdin thing go?"

"Papyrus succeeded in apprehending the human. After he did that he called me. Then the human, it asked that the King be the one to take its soul. Last requests and all that."

"I hear ya. Is there, like, anything you need us to do?"

"Well, I don't think I'll be able to stay in Hotland that long, so I'll need you to take it the rest of the way to the castle. Can you two handle it?"

"I'm pretty sure I can. What about you, brah?"

"..."

"Yeah, we'll be fine."

"Thanks, guys. We'll arrive in Hotland pretty soon. Meet us at the dock."

"Got it. See you then."

Undyne hung up her cell phone and turned to Frisk. "All right, brat. I'll be handing you off to two members of the Hotland unit once we arrive."

Frisk nodded, and resumed gazing blankly at the surroundings.

Aside from Undyne's phone call, neither of the passengers made a sound as the Riverperson ferried them away from Snowdin. Undyne did little more than watch the child for most of the trip. Frisk herself absently watched the scenery of the underground go by. Having never seen Waterfall before, Frisk allowed herself to drink in the scenery. It was absolutely beautiful, though she supposed it was a shame she wouldn't be able to fully appreciate it, what with everything that's happened.

"We're almost there."

Undyne's harsh voice broke Frisk out of her reverie and made her flinch. Now that she wasn't lost in her surroundings, she became aware that the temperature was steadily rising uncomfortably. It was here that Frisk started to be glad that she didn't take any extra clothing for her trip. Undyne, meanwhile, was starting to sweat a bit.

 _Oh yeah, she is a fish,_ Frisk thought. _Of course she would hate the heat. That's what she meant…_

Eventually they reached a shore, where the cave walls were bathed in a dull reddish glow, from the lava which wasn't too far away.

"Here we are," the Riverperson said calmly, as if s/he didn't care, or even notice that a mass murderer was his/her current passenger. "Welcome to Hotland."

Frisk stepped off, as did Undyne, who was clearly uncomfortable in her armor. Frisk could swear she heard sizzling.

As Undyne continued doing a pretty good impression of a fish stick, she noticed something.

"Where ARE those two? They should've been here by now. They're only stationed on the… *pant* ...next floor up…"

A couple minutes passed, and still no one. Frisk looked at Undyne's labored breathing and couldn't help but feel bad. Then, an idea struck her as she remembered something. _Thank goodness for non-perishable monster food,_ thought Frisk as she began reach into the spacious pockets of her cargo shorts.

Undyne immediately noticed Frisk doing so, and instinctively reached to summon a spear, but then she remembered how Papyrus told her that the kid dropped their knife in the snow and handed over her only other weapon, a fighting glove. _Then what's it doing…?_

To her surprise, Frisk produced one of those specialty double popsicles they made in Snowdin- A bisicle, if memory served. Frisk broke it in half and held one out to Undyne. "I, um, noticed you were starting to roast alive in that armor, so I thought you might want some of this popsicle I got."

Undyne looked doubtfully down at the unisicle, then glared at Frisk, who was looking back up at her somewhat apologetically.

Undyne continued to glare.

Frisk smiled nervously.

Undyne's expression didn't change.

Frisk started sweating, and not just because of the heat.

Undyne's glare continued unabated.

Frisk withdrew the popsicle once she became aware of the hole being drilled into her soul by Undyne's remaining eye. "Well, uh… more for me, I guess," she said, pocketing one of the unisicles as she started eating the other one.

Suddenly the two of them heard two sets of armored footsteps barreling towards their location. They looked and saw two heavily armored figures who were built like bricks made out of smaller bricks sprinting towards them.

One of them, the one who appeared to have rabbit ears, stopped and caught his breath. "Sorry… we took… so long… to get here…" he panted. The other one- the one with the more dragon-ish head, didn't show any visible signs of fatigue.

"Well you oughta be," Undyne scolded, sounding equally out of breath from the heat. "What… kept you?"

"Elevator… was busted. Had to… go the long way… through the lab."

Undyne now felt a little guilty for yelling at her underling like that. Just a little. "Well, you should've... called me then."

"I totally forgot to do that. My bad."

The captain groaned in exasperation. They were competent fighters, no doubt about that, but when it came to official procedures and discipline, the two of them could be a bit… absentminded.

"Well, here's the human," she said irritably, punctuating it by shoving Frisk towards them (causing Frisk to accidentally drop her half-finished unisicle). "If it tries anything, you have my permission to use lethal force."

"We'll be fine. Right, bro?"

"..."

"Well, take care of yourselves," Undyne said as she reboarded the ferry that was politely waiting for her still. "Waterfall," she told the Riverperson.

S/he nodded, then turned to Frisk and the two Royal Guards. "Make sure you wash your hands," s/he cryptically said as s/he drove off with Undyne in tow. "Gardening is dirty work, after all."

* * *

Dr. Alphys rarely ever answered the door, but when two members of the Royal Guard needed to pass through her lab due to the elevator outage, she didn't refuse. She figured it was about the human child, and that they would come back through soon. And they did, but she wasn't expecting them to have brought the kid with them.

Alphys was keeping a close eye on Frisk ever since she stepped out of the ruins, and was keeping tabs on her as she cut a swathe through the Underground- partly so she could keep Undyne appraised of the situation, and partly because of her own morbid curiosity.

And then she saw the confrontation with Papyrus.

Alphys didn't know Papyrus personally, even though she did work with Sans once (though shortly after her DT experiments resulted in utter disaster, Sans up and quit with no warning). However, she knew what he was like from how Undyne talked about him.

"Oh, that goofball? I've never seen anyone more devoted to a cause in my life! It's kind of inspiring. I don't know if he'll make it, but with enthusiasm like that, he's bound to go somewhere!"

And so it was that she watched Papyrus staring her down with horrible anticipation, hoping against hope that Papyrus would survive this, and was simultaneously relieved and shocked when she saw the kid drop the knife and fall to the ground in a crying heap.

And she heard everything.

She forgot to let Undyne know what was going on, but even if she had, she would've left out the bit where they let the killer stay in the house. She didn't know what went on after that point, though. She didn't have the cameras set up _everywhere_. She still had standards when it came to privacy.

She happened to be away from her monitor at the time, heating up some dinner when the back door got a knock from those two Royal Guards, and as a result she missed both Undyne going to Snowdin and arriving in Hotland.

And now here she was, with the human in her lab.

Truth be told, having started the Human Fan Club a while back, she already had some respect for their kind from what little she was able to gather about them. And even with all that this child had done, she still understood, and had sympathy to a degree.

Finally she decided to speak up.

"So… um, you guys have the human? Didn't Undyne, you know… take their soul?"

The bunny-eared one summarized what Undyne told him, and Alphys nodded after he finished his story.

"Okay… The main elevator isn't close to being fixed, though, so you're going to have to take the long way up." In truth, she had deactivated the elevator as a precautionary measure to stall the human from reaching and killing Asgore. But now that that was no longer a concern, Alphys now wanted to stop the child from dying pointlessly. In spite of all that had happened, she still liked humans.

"Alright, thanks. We'll be headin' out now." The two guards started for the door, but stopped once they realized the child wasn't with them. The bunny-eared one panicked (the dragon-looking one was stoic as ever) but a second later they saw the human looking over Alphys's anime collection.

She turned to Alphys with a confused look. "How'd you get all this anyway?"

Alphys was startled that the human was actually talking to her. Quickly regaining her composure (or trying, at any rate), she replied, "W-well, sometimes this s-stuff falls in with the garbage that humans throw away, and it, um… it ends up here."

That made sense to Frisk. It would also explain why most of it was from the early 2000s at the latest, when anime was just starting to become mainstream in America. "Once you're all on the surface, you should look up this show called One Punch Man. I think it'd be right up your alley."

With that, Frisk turned back towards the two Royal Guards, and after confirming that yes, she was ready to go, the three of them started for the back door to the rest of Hotland.

And slammed into the automatic door when it failed to open.

"Huh?" Alphys uttered, confused. She went over to the door, and it didn't slide open like it usually did. She tried to pry it open with force. That didn't work.

She was about to ask one of the Royal Guards to try and use their sword to pry it open when the lights suddenly shut off. Alphys groaned. Now she had a pretty good idea what was going on. _There must be a power outage. Maybe the Core's having problems again..._

"Well, well," a booming, flamboyant, slightly metallic voice sounded from somewhere nearby, "Aren't we in a hurry to leave?"

Alphys froze. "Mettaton? What are you doing?" She asked hesitantly, with a bit of suspicion.

"Nothing you need to be worried about," Mettaton's voice answered nonchalantly. "It's just that in light of all that's happened, this may be my first, last, and only chance to have a real human guest star on my show!"

The lights went back on.

And Frisk was gone.

* * *

 **Hope you enjoyed Chapter 3! Don't expect every chapter to go up this quickly, as school just now decided to start kicking me in the pants with 3 essays and 2 tests within 1 week of each other. Hooray.**

 **Just a quick confession to make: I hate Mettaton. At first, I didn't mind too much. I thought his gimmick of being a robotic entertainer was fun enough, and Mettaton EX was (and still is) one of my favorite boss fights of all time.**

 **But somewheres around my third playthrough, I suddenly put together what the deal was with the statues. I realized the statue in Waterfall was the original statue in front of the Core, and Mettaton replaced it with a statue of himself and threw the memorial in the garbage. I have absolutely no sympathy for him after that and I was honestly tempted to kill him just once, but I held off for Alphys's sake. (She's my 2nd favorite character, just after Asgore)**

 **Just as a reminder, I don't even have a plan for how this is going to go, I'm just letting the characters do their thing. One last question I want your input on: Should I give Those Two Guys actual names? Is that some sort of heresy punishable by death within the Undertale fandom? I know exactly what I'd call them, too… but you'll never know unless I put it in a future chapter!**


	5. Chapter 4: Investigation

Sans was already in a bad mood when Undyne's next call came in. But you already knew that. How could he not be when the kid- the human child he promised to watch out for- is just lying down and accepting death?

He knew the kid had somehow over-wrote the weed's ability to Reset. But not because there weren't any Resets after she landed.

Rather, because there were.

Well, they weren't… full resets. Instead, it seemed as though Frisk, at some points throughout the underground, managed to exert enough Determination to leave a record of her place in the space-time continuum, and would be able to send her consciousness there at a moment's notice. This phenomenon was incredibly rare in the Underground, but it had been documented in the past, and they dubbed it "The Save File." It was something Gaster had been looking into before the accident, actually.

Sans could remember every time a monster had gotten the best of Frisk, and the human would simply try again from their last "Save." But in this last few hours, he couldn't help wonder… the kid was clearly devastated when she discovered the nature of her actions. But if she really felt bad, why didn't she go back?

There wasn't a sound to be heard throughout Casa de Skeleton. Papyrus was in the kitchen, and had been since Undyne left.

"I INTEND TO COOK UP A GREAT FEAST OF SPAGHETTI FOR EVERYONE WHEN WE GO TO THE SURFACE," he explained earlier, but Sans knew it was just a coping mechanism. There wasn't anything Papyrus could do. Sans could probably do something, but…

*RING*

Sans was jolted out of his train of thought by the sound of Papyrus's phone ringing. The newest member of the Royal Guard fumbled around for his phone.

"GREETINGS, UNDYNE," answered Papyrus in a faux-jovial tone of voice. "HOW IS EVERYTHING GOING WITH THE HUMAN?"

Sans watched as Papyrus's expression slowly progressed from apprehension to… something that couldn't decide how it wanted to feel.

"OKAY THEN. I WILL BE THERE SHORTLY."

Papyrus hung up and turned to Sans. "IT WOULD SEEM THE HUMAN HAS BEEN ABDUCTED."

"huh. who did it?" replied Sans, who now seemed to have regained his nonchalance.

"I… THINK IT WAS METTATON?"

"huh. well, considering he's a celebrity, i guess it was only a matter of time before he started committing crimes and getting away with them."

"SANS! I'M BEING SERIOUS!"

"calm down bro. you go to hotland and help out undyne. i have to check on something."

"WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO? ONCE WE FIND THE HUMAN, I DON'T THINK UNDYNE WILL LET THEM GET AWAY AGAIN, AND MIGHT JUST-"

"dude. bro. relax, okay? i have a plan. i'll call you in a bit."

"BUT YOU DON'T EVEN HAVE A- YOU KNOW WHAT? NEVER MIND. I HOPE YOU KNOW WHAT YOU'RE DOING…"

* * *

Alphys was pacing nervously. The Royal Guard had been dispatched throughout Hotland after Frisk's disappearance, trying to find where Mettaton could have taken her. Mettaton had fled the lab and the family home in Waterfall was also conspicuously empty. Until he was located, the Royal Guard had basically locked down all the elevators, puzzles, etc. until he was found.

Undyne had asked her to try and locate Mettaton using the cameras she had set up all over the Underground. She was doing just that, when suddenly, Sans.

"what's up, doc?" Sans said casually, causing Alphys to jump a foot in the air.

"S-Sans? I thought everything in Hotland was supposed to be on lockdown until we find Frisk! How did you get in here?"

"eh, i took a shortcut."

Alphys was about to press for what that even meant, but Sans was a mystery surrounded by an enigma inside a cheap dollar-store joke book, so she let it slide. "Okay, WHY did you get in here?"

"trying to find the kid, same as you. something just feels off about this…"

The two of them stood there as Alphys flipped through cameras for a few minutes. Eventually…

"Hey, this camera was working just fine before," Alphys said as she came to a screen which was all static. "But all the other cameras were designed specifically to withstand the intense heat of Hotland and all the-"

"i think that's where they are," Sans cut in. "where is that camera supposed to go?"

Alphys looked at the number on the screen. Each camera had a different number, and Alphys had long since memorized which camera was which number. "I think this is in the backstage area of the theater near the Spider Village."

"huh. cool. hey, can you do me a solid and not tell undyne until i get back?"

"What?" Alphys responded, somewhat taken aback. "Wh-why?"

"Like i said. something seems fishy about this. even without undyne." He winked, then started up the stairs to the upper floor of the lab.

"Where are you going?"

"i know a shortcut. oh, and one more thing," Sans turned his head back towards Alphys, "i need you to warm up one of the examination tables in your basement."

* * *

 _You know, when I woke up this morning, I didn't think I was going to be abducted by a calculator on wheels, but at this point I should probably start expecting this crap to happen._

Frisk seemed to be in the backstage area of some theater with a castle backdrop. Mettaton must've been really into theatrics, since Frisk was inside one of those birdcage looking things you usually see princesses inside when they get captured by dragons and whatnot.

"So, human!" her captor greeted, in all his rectangular glory. "I bet you're wondering what you're doing here!"

 _Sure, monologuing. Why not._

"Well, you're new to the Underground, so you probably never heard of me. I am Mettaton!" The robot flashed a few poses that did not look right coming from a rectangle. "The Underground's number one and only star! And you're going to be part of my last- and greatest- episode!"

The robot flashed another pose. "It'll have action! Bloodshed! Romance! Bloodshed! Drama! Bloodshed! And did I mention the bloodshed? Because there'll be a LOT of that. The audience will just adore it- especially with a human involved."

"It doesn't matter," Frisk said, completely unfazed. "Asgore will get my soul anyway, and then he'll break the barrier, so we all win."

"Now who ever said anything about breaking the barrier?"

Frisk let out a small gasp as her tan complexion suddenly went a little pale. "W-what?!"

"I don't want humanity dead. Far from it. I'm actually a pretty big fan, in spite of the actions of some of them. Truth is, I was built for one thing and one thing only- to entertain! And performing in front of humans has always been my dream! The problem is, I wasn't built until that last kid got his soul taken, so if the barrier were to get broken… well, entertaining humans would be pretty difficult if Asgore has his way with them."

Mettaton got uncomfortably close to Frisk's cage. "I get to be humanity's star, AND their savior! So what if you have to lose out on this deal. It's not like anyone would miss you anyway."

Frisk was shaking ever so slightly. _No no no NO NO NO THIS WASN'T SUPPOSED TO HAPPEN!_

"Showtime's in 15 minutes, darling! Make sure you compose yourself- you're gonna be on TV, after all!"

Between Mettaton's gloating and Frisk's freaking out, neither of them noticed a pair of blank eye sockets withdraw into the shadows.

* * *

"all right, mettaton's gonna be doing a live broadcast in 15 minutes," Sans said immediately as he returned to Alphys's lab (the upper level one), not even bothering with jump-scaring her this time as he emerged from the same shortcut. "you sure you got the right theater?"

"Yeah. And I got the equipment ready like you asked. What do you need it for?"

"you'll see. let undyne know where the kid is. after that, can i borrow your phone? i need to make a call."

* * *

 **Sorry it took me so long to post this, and sorry if the quality isn't that great but college has been real stressful and I just haven't had the time (and most definitely was NOT sinking dozens of hours into Final Fantasy XIV in the meantime), and finals just barely finished and I wanted to get this out as fast as possible.**

 **One question that occurred to me is whether or not Sans would know about Alphys's DT experiments. I think he did. There's a lot left up to interpretation about Sans, his backstory, and his relationship with Gaster, and he clearly knows more than he lets on, so I decided he would at least know Alphys works with Souls.**

 **What's weird is that I have the next two or three chapters planned out, and I have the ending pretty much figured out... But I have no idea what happens in between. Like I said before, I'm mainly just writing by the seat of my pants.**

 **Stay tuned for potential excitement!**


	6. Chapter 5: Intervention

"Good evening, beauties and gentlebeauties!" Mettaton said into the camera, still in his rectangular, calculator-esque body. "We have a really special episode for you today! Why is that, you may ask? Well… it all boils down to our guest tonight!" The camera panned right, to show Frisk- no longer in a cage- standing at the start of a particularly grueling obstacle course, not looking particularly enthused or terrified.

Mettaton would have loved this to have a live audience, but he wasn't an idiot. He had interfered with official Royal Guard business after all. At the same time, however, he couldn't resist the chance to milk this for all it was worth.

"Now then, human, what's your name?" Mettaton asked, shoving his microphone directly in Frisk's face.

Pushing it aside slightly, Frisk started to reply. "Um, my name is-"

"Great news!" Mettaton interrupted, pulling the microphone back. "And now the main event!" he continued, gesturing to the dangerous gauntlet they were at the front of.

"Watch in amazement as our human contestant attempts to traverse this dangerous gauntlet- designed by yours truly- where they will contend with: Jets of fire! The swinging blades of certain doom! And, last but not least, the dreaded tile puzzle!"

 _Not the tile puzzle,_ Frisk groaned internally, zoning out during Mettaton's explanation of the tiles. _I lucked out when Flowey messed with it last time, and now I actually have to solve it now? Hmm… I wonder what Flowey is up to right now?_

"But they had better hurry! If they do not solve this course in less than 3 minutes…" The camera panned all the way to the end of the Terrifying Gauntlet of Peril ™ to show a comically oversized cartoon bomb with a lit fuse. "...This show will most definitely end with a bang!"

Mettaton turned back to Frisk. "Now, just as a refresher, allow me to go over the rules to the tile maze…"

Suddenly, the door to the studio flew open. "HOLD IT RIGHT THERE, FIEND!" shouted a familiar voice from the now open doorway. "INTERFERING WITH THE ROYAL GUARD IS BAD ENOUGH, BUT MISUSING PUZZLES FOR SUCH A TWISTED END IS SIMPLY UNFORGIVABLE!"

A certain skeleton, backed by two heavily-armored royal guardsmen. "ON BEHALF OF THE ROYAL GUARD, I, THE GREAT PAPYRUS, SHALL STOP YOU!"

There was a dramatic silence as the Royal Guards faced off against Mettaton. Then, a small sniffling could be heard coming from the typically bombastic skeleton.

"I'M SORRY, IT'S JUST… *sniff* I'VE WAITED MY ENTIRE LIFE TO SAY SOMETHING LIKE THAT. I REQUIRE A MOMENT TO COMPOSE MYSELF." Papyrus wiped a tear out of his eyesocket. Before anyone could raise any questions about how a skeleton could cry in the first place, Papyrus straightened up with a determined look. "ALL RIGHT, MOMENT OVER! LET US BATTLE!"

"Ooh, I always wanted to play the heavy!" Mettaton said to himself as he pressed a button on his robotic body, activating several disco balls that emerged from the ceiling, preparing to fire lasers at the intruders. "Okay then… bring it."

* * *

Frisk was mesmerized by the havoc going on. Seeing all these heavy magic attacks being flung left and right was really quite impressive when she wasn't on the receiving end. She watched as Mettaton's missiles flew every which way, expertly dodged or deflected by Papyrus and his bone attacks, and the two armored monsters weaving in and out in a complex formation that resembled an elaborate dance.

Lasers flew every which way, but Papyrus was fighting at his best- in the defense of his human pal- and not a single one hit him. It seemed that, when properly motivated, the friendly pasta lover was quite formidable a fighter.

As the spectacle played out before her eyes, Frisk suddenly became aware of a presence behind her.

"hey kid," the familiar voice of Sans said quietly, though not quite a whisper. "you must be quite the casanova if this many people are fighting over you. listen, imma need you grab on to me and not let go."

Frisk did so, not really having any other choice.

"don't worry about missing the fight, pap records everything mettaton does." And with that, the two disappeared into the shadows, none of the combatants the wiser.

* * *

They emerged from the shortcut and Alphys was wiping off some equipment when she flinched suddenly from their appearance. Frisk was a combination of nauseous and confused about how they got here. When she became more aware of her surroundings, she took in her surroundings- the floor was dirty, everything had dust on it- Frisk really hoped it was just because everything was old and that it wasn't the other kind of dust- and there was all sorts of equipment that looked medical in nature. It was unnerving, to say the least.

"okay kid, can you lay down on this table here? i want to check something."

Frisk nodded. Even if she was suspicious about being asked to get on an examination table in a creepy basement, it wasn't like she really cared. As Frisk lay down, Alphys pushed a button, causing a lamp-like device above the table to turn on.

You see, souls have the innate ability to "Check" the status of another soul. Only some of the time, however. Monsters could check other monsters, and humans could check monsters. However, human souls were very difficult to get a proper read on. During her research on Soul Power, Alphys had invented a device that did the job reasonably well.

A nearby monitor flickered on. On it was a depiction of Frisk's soul, red and heart-shaped. Her LV, HP, ATK, and DEF were at the top, and there were a few other stats below it. The one Sans was curious about was the next one after those- DT.

Determination was the substance within the human soul that allowed it to continue to exist after the human's death. It was something monster souls lacked, which was why Alphys had done research on its effects.

"hey doc, can you come look at their dt?" Sans asked, gesturing towards the monitor.

Alphys obliged, but after reading the data, looked back and forth between Frisk and the DT score. "This… this can't be right," Alphys said, confused. "The last human soul I worked with had WAY more Determination than hers, but based on these readings, this soul has a significantly higher capacity for it than I have ever seen. In fact, it looks like the DT was depleted fairly recently. On its own."

Sans grimaced. _that's what i thought. the kid gave up, they lost all their determination, and now they can't..._

Alphys noticed his change in expression. "Do you know anything about this?"

Sans sighed. "you might want to sit down… does the word "reset" mean anything to you?"

* * *

Papyrus dodged another swathe of bombs launched by the flamboyant calculator that was Mettaton. It was actually fairly easy to do, but for all his work (as well as the two guards fighting alongside him) they had yet to even make a dent in Mettaton's metallic body.

"THIS IS GETTING US NOWHERE FAST. THE GREAT PAPYRUS ALWAYS HAS TO GO FAST. THIS IS SIMPLY UNACCEPTABLE!"

"Hey, bro," the bunny-eared Royal Guard said quietly. "I've seen a few episodes of the show with my bud here, and, like, it doesn't look like he's going all out. We think that if he was going all out, then he'd, you know… be more vulnerable?"

Papyrus beamed. "THAT IS A SPLENDID IDEA, UM… WHAT DID YOU SAY YOUR NAME WAS AGAIN?"

"Oh, me? My name's Reggie." He gestured towards his draconic counterpart. "My bro here is named Roger."

"I SHALL REMEMBER THAT. HEY METTATON!" Papyrus turned towards their opponent. "IF THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE YOUR GRAND FINALE, THIS IS A POOR WAY TO END YOUR SHOW! ALL YOU ARE DOING IS SITTING THERE WHILE WE WAIL ON YOU. IT IS NOT VERY CLIMACTIC. COME ON, YOU CAN DO BETTER!"

Mettaton bristled. "Not very climactic, is it? Well, I guess now's a good time as any to show off my new body!"

With that, metallic plates of armor folded away and changed their shape. Parts twisted their shape as Mettaton transformed from a rectangle into a more humanoid shape, with an alternating color scheme of white and hot pink, with long black hair.

"Is this more like it, darling?" Mettaton EX spoke with a significantly more breathy and less obnoxious voice.

Papyrus gaped. "YOU… YOU ARE ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL! B-BUT THAT SHALL NOT DETER ME FROM MY DUTY AS A ROYAL GUARDSMAN! NOW LET US RESUME OUR-"

Suddenly, a crash reverberated through the theater as something- or someone- smashed through the wall. That someone was carrying an ethereal blue spear, wearing awesome-looking armor, and had flowing red hair in a ponytail. Oh, and she was also a fish with an eyepatch.

"Sorry I'm late," Undyne addressed her underlings, "but it's a tactic I picked up from human history- the hero's friends fight the bad guy first, then shows up later and utterly wastes him!" With that, Undyne turned and pointed dramatically at Mettaton. "You! You intercepted our delivery of the human, interfering with monsterkind's dream of breaking the barrier! In the name of King Asgore, I will take back what is ours! BRING IT ON!"

* * *

 **Sorry I took so long with this one! But I had to take a class over the summer, and between that, my job, and Final Fantasy XIV, I didn't have enough time to keep writing. But inspiration has struck once more!**


	7. Chapter 6: Realization

**Sorry I took so long. Also, I should point out fight scenes are NOT my strong point. Mainly I just needed to get to the other part of the chapter.**

* * *

Alphys could only sit in silence as she processed everything Sans had told her. The two had since moved into another room to avoid disturbing Frisk, who was just sort of lying down.

 _Someone with enough Determination can rewind time and make things happen differently?_ It was incredible. She understood the principles behind it just fine- she was Royal Scientist after all- but she was amazed that this human child had the ability to time travel. She just had one question.

"But… from what I gathered, she feels horrible about what she did. Why wouldn't she go back and change it?" _Because heaven knows I sure would,_ she mentally added.

Sans sighed. "that's kind of the reason i wanted to check the kid's stats. looks like her emotional state took a massive downturn, which caused her determination to decrease to dangerous levels. without enough determination, she can't reset."

This got Alphys thinking. "So… if we figured out a way to replenish her Determination somehow, she'd get this power back. And if that happened…"

"then she can go back and fix this whole mess."

Alphys folded her arms. "Which means we need to find a way to restore her DT levels somehow."

"actually, we have a way. it's right in the other room."

Alphys froze. _The DT Extractor._ Her hands balled into fists. _No. No, I swore I'd never touch that… that_ thing _ever again._

"I- I don't think that would be a good idea. It didn't work when I tried it on m-monsters, and I have no idea what it would to to a human! And- and then we don't know if there would be an adverse effect from transferring DT from one human soul to another, and the machine is really old, and-"

Sans held up a bony hand, cutting her off. "okay, doc? i'm going to be serious for just a second. i don't know exactly what happened here, only that it went horribly wrong. but this might be our only chance to save her, and all the monsters who she…" he trailed off.

Alphys blinked a couple times. "I'd expect you to hate her. Why do you care so much if she lives?"

"because i promised someone."

The two stood in silence for a moment or two. Alphys closed her eyes and nodded. "All right. I'll do it."

Sans smiled his same stale skeletal smile. "i knew i could count on you."

"But I can't complete the procedure without another human soul, since the DT needs to come from somewhere. The only ones we have are in the castle, and after what happened, I don't think I'd be able to ask Asgore to use them again."

"that won't be an issue. i can just drop by and borrow one. no one will care if i snoop around, i got a part time job over there."

Alphys nodded. "I'll get the machine ready."

* * *

Undyne and Mettaton were locked in a cycle of flinging projectiles- lasers and missiles on one side, ethereal blue spears on the other- and dodging the others' attacks. They had yet to touch one another, and were causing massive damage to the stage around them.

Papyrus could only look on in awe, trying in vain to keep track of what was going on. Reggie and Roger had gotten exhausted, but Papyrus, having been blessed with absurd levels of endurance, was still raring to go.

To him, the two were just blurs of white and pink and blue and red, barely visible to the human- or monster- eye. Now, Papyrus wasn't stupid. Occasionally childish and naive, yes, but not stupid. He didn't have it in him to do pull them off himself but he knew the techniques Undyne was using backwards and forwards.

As such, he could follow the battle surprisingly well.

"Hey, dude, I'm completely lost," Reggie said from behind Papyrus. "What's going on?"

"METTATON IS SIMPLY TOO FAST FOR UNDYNE TO HIT! TRY AS SHE MIGHT, SHE CAN'T LAND A SINGLE BLOW ON HIM!"

"Actually," Roger spoke up suddenly, "It looks like they're going in circles. Couldn't you, I don't know, hit where Mettaton is going to be?"

"THAT IS A BRILLIANT SUGGESTION!"

Papyrus looked closely at the blurs made by the two combatants, readying a bone attack. He didn't have time to prepare his special attack, so a normal attack would have to do. He waited, staring at the two fighters as they worked their way around the room, until-

"THERE!"

A bone flew up and knocked right into Mettaton, knocking him into the ceiling, stunning him on impact.

"Ha! Nice one, Pap! Leave the rest to me!"

And with that, Undyne leaped upwards and jammed one of her spears into Mettaton before flinging him down into the floor.

Mettaton, now with a giant hole in his chassis, could only lie down and look at the sad state of his battle body. "DanG iT… AlPHys wArnED me tHat THis fORm tRAdEd aRMor fOr spEEd."

Undyne made a heroic pose for her audience of… 4, since the cameras had long since been destroyed in the struggle. "Ha ha ha! No one can stand against the Royal Guard and get away with it!"

Her gloating, however, was interrupted by Reggie.

"Um, hey, Undyne? I have a question about that human we were here to get."

"Yeah?" Undyne turned around, looking a little irritated at being interrupted.

"...Anyone know where it is?"

It was then that Undyne realized that her human prisoner was nowhere to be found. The human couldn't have gotten hurt during the fight- there would still have been a body.

Papyrus had a flash of realization. _SO THAT'S WHAT THAT LAZY BONES WAS PLANNING! PERHAPS MY FRIEND WILL BE SAFE AFTER ALL!_

If Papyrus's expression showed his thoughts, Undyne wasn't paying attention. She was standing over Mettaton (vainly trying to put himself back together) and yelling "Where is it?! I know you know something, so spit it out!"

Mettaton didn't know either. His mind raced to get the scary fish off him before the damage really was too much to repair.

 _Wait… They had to have found me before I started broadcasting! Otherwise they couldn't have gotten here in time. That means Alphys had to have been involved somehow. But she wouldn't want to take part in human hunting no matter what they did, and that means…_

"I think I have a pretty good idea where the human is," Mettaton said with a smirk.

* * *

Alphys was tuning up the DT Extractor, as it hadn't been in use for years. Frisk was still lying down on that table, waiting for nothing in particular.

"Hey, doctor? What is that thing for anyway?"

Alphys explained that she built it to study the Human soul and extract the Determination from it (along with explaining just what Determination is) but her experiments were a failure, trailing off before she got to the painful part and leaving it at that.

"Oh, so you're going to use it to take out my soul or something?"

"Wh-what?" Alphys replied, somewhat shocked. "Of course not! Your soul has a Determination deficiency, so I'll use the Determination in one of the King's human souls to try to replenish your own. Then, you can… rewind?"

"Reset."

"Reset. Thank you. Reset back to before all this… death happened."

Frisk didn't budge. "What if it doesn't work? I mean, you said the machine failed. What if it fails with me?"

"Don't worry, I think you should fine…" Alphys trailed off again when she suddenly became aware of someone entering the room.

"Oh, Sans! Perfect timing!" Alphys said, somewhat relieved, as she turned back around. "Did you get it without any… problems… oh no… You're not Sans." Her face blanched as not-Sans entered the room.

"So that slacker is in on this too," Undyne said, with barely restrained fury on her face. "I'll have to have a nice long talk with him later. Anyway… Alphys, why do you have _it_ in your basement?"

Alphys was freaking out at this point. "Look, Undyne this isn't what it looks like, it-it's a long story," she stammered. "If we wait until Sans gets back he can probably explain it better than I can-"

"Even if I would believe anything you two say for a second," Undyne interrupted, her words causing Alphys to flinch, "I already made the mistake of letting that thing live. I'm not going to repeat it."

"B-but Undyne! You don't understand! We could fix this! We can fix everything that-"

"They're dead, Alphys! Nothing is going to change that! Now hand over the human and I'll do what I should have done hours ago!"

"No, you don't understand, you have to-"

"Stop it," a quiet yet surprisingly strong voice shouted. They both turned towards its source.

"...F-frisk?"

The human child stood up and walked towards the two.

"Stop fighting over me. Please. I don't want any more monsters to have to get hurt because of me. Undyne's right, I don't think your plan is going to work." She looked back up at Undyne. "I didn't mean for any of this to happen. I really want to talk with Asgore, but apparently that isn't going to work… it'll be a lot easier for all of us if you just do it right here."

"Frisk," Alphys whispered, a tear forming in her eye. "No…"

"But before you do," Frisk continued, "Please, please don't be mad at Alphys. She was trying to fix everything, she needed me alive for it, she wasn't trying to betray you. Please tell me you'll forgive her."

Undyne looked back down at the human's pleading expression. "I don't have to do anything for _you_ ," she spat. "But you know what, you're right. I shouldn't be mad at her. I should be mad at you."

She summoned six magical blue spears.

Alphys couldn't move. _No… please no… Sans, please hurry up!_

"You deserve to die for what you've done, human scum!"

Frisk's mouth curled into a sad smile.

"I couldn't agree more," the child said calmly.

And with a snap of Undyne's fingers, all six spears rocketed forward, skewering Frisk, going cleanly through her body almost all at once.

Alphys was about ready to vomit.

"hey doc, i'm back, sorry for taking so long," came the voice of Sans as he emerged from a well-hidden shortcut. The skeleton was holding a jar with a yellow human soul floating inside. "is the machine up and ready to…"

He stopped.

He let go of the jar, which was halted in place by blue energy and gently set down.

Frisk's body, which now had a pretty sizeable hole in it, tipped over, hitting the ground with a dull, wet _THUD._

The lights in Sans' eye sockets went out.

"What on Earth did I miss?!" he asked no one in particular, in a tone of voice that was very much not himself.

Before anyone could say anything, the dim lights went out completely. A few monitors shut off, only to turn back on with a red screen.

Dr. Alphys looked around, confused and terrified. "What's going on? Guys…?"

Sans just stood there, staring at the fresh corpse at the center of the room.

 _I'm sorry… I couldn't keep my promise after all._

Just then, a dim red glow appeared from Frisk's chest, taking the form of a heart shape.

Undyne smiled, seeming to forget the sudden change in atmosphere. "Finally."

She produced a glass jar similar to the one Sans had. Before she could move forward to claim the soul, she was overcome with a sudden chill, as if something terrible was about to happen that she couldn't do anything to prevent.

She looked at the other two, and realized they felt the same way.

"That was disappointing," a childish, yet murderous voice reverberated throughout the lab. "I was hoping things would play out a little more, but hey-"

A yellow flower emerged from the ground, followed by a thorny vine that quickly wrapped around the dull glowing soul.

"At least I got what I wanted."

* * *

 **Remember how I said I had an end goal in sight and was writing by the seat of my pants to get there? Well, we're in the endgame now.**


	8. Chapter 7: Ascension

After what felt like an eternity, Sans awoke.

 _Huh. This feels kind of like a reset, but… what happened, anyway?_

 _...Oh. Right. The kid got killed. The flower got her soul._

Having remembered what happened to him, almost like coming out of a hangover, Sans finally decided to take in his surroundings.

Or rather, lack thereof.

 _Huh. This is different._

He was in an endless black void. There was nothing but darkness on all sides. There was even a black, endless void below where he was standing. Try to figure that one out.

"Well, well, well… if it isn't Smiley Trashbag," came a voice that seemed to come from everywhere simultaneously, and yet also sounded like it was coming from Sans's mind, so he couldn't look towards where it was.

"I hope you like it here in MY world, Sans. You see, I'm filled with Determination from the Human souls I took, so I felt like redecorating a bit."

Sans, being the master of concealing emotions that he was, didn't let on to the fact he had a miniature heart attack.

"S… souls? Like… plural? As in, more than one, two more than none?"

A chilling laugh echoed through his consciousness. "You catch on quick, Smiley. After I took Chara's soul," Flowey explained, ignoring, or perhaps not noticing the look of confusion on Sans' face at hearing the name that wasn't Frisk, "I immediately hightailed it back to Asgore's castle like I planned, and took the 5 Souls he already collected."

 _Five?_ Sans maintained his poker face. _But Asgore got six. Why did he-_

Sans' eye sockets widened ever so slightly.

 _The Yellow Soul. The one I brought back for the DT transfer. He must've been so caught up in getting the kid's soul that he didn't notice!_

"So, finding that's gonna be on my agenda. But I think you're more worth my time. You've cost me my fair share of Resets, so I think it's high time I returned the favor."

Sans cracked his neck in anticipation. _All right. The soul is still out there. Hopefully someone picked it up. Guess that means I just have to buy myself some time._

He smirked.

"Bring it on," Sans said, mockingly. "When you have to go your whole life only have 1 HP, you know a thing or two about dodg-"

And that was the last thing he said before about 57 thorny vines shot out of the darkness and put more holes in him than swiss cheese.

* * *

Sans awoke.

 _Huh. This feels kind of like a reset, but…_

His eyes widened. He jumped out of the way just in time to avoid 57 thorny vines.

"You thought you were getting off that easily? Well, you were mistaken," the voice from the darkness spoke. "In case you forget, I'm in control now. _And we have all the time in the world_."

A beam of energy shot out with zero warning, disintegrating him.

* * *

Sans woke up and without thinking, jumped to the left to dodge the vines, dodged right to avoid the laser-

And was promptly set on fire for his troubles.

* * *

Sans woke up, avoided the vines, ducked under the beam, dodged out of the way of the fire. He managed to see a second jet of fire, and ducked out of the way-

-Right into a ring of "Friendliness Pellets" which struck him directly in his fragile Monster soul.

* * *

It went on like this for what felt like years. It might have actually been years for all Sans knew. The pattern of avoiding all the previous attacks in the pattern, then being blindsided by the next one was starting to take its toll on him.

Flowey had most likely not changed up his attacks at all simply to toy with him. That worked just fine for Sans, though he'd really like to stop dodging and just take a nap.

"Aww, what's wrong? Getting tired?" Flowey called mockingly. "Don't worry, my dear skeleton… You'll be able to sleep soon. _Forever._ But first…"

Sans looked up when he saw 6 hearts appear in a ring. Blue, cyan, purple, green, orange… a muted, quivering red one…

...and no yellow one.

In the middle of the hearts, a monitor appeared, like a computer screen. On it appeared a maniacally grinning face with blood-red eyes.

Around the screen suddenly appeared a horrible mishmash of vines, flowers, metal bits, a long protruding sideways mouth with teeth, surrounded by 6 tubes curved around in the similitude of flower petals. It looked absolutely horrifying, like something that shouldn't exist even theoretically within the bounds of dimension.

The six Souls floated into the machine, merging with it.

"Take a good long look, Sans… _cause it's gonna be the last thing you'll ever see_."

With a chilling, distorted laugh, a ring of Friendliness Pellets materialized around Sans, and began to close in around him. Sans braces for the inevitable-

When a few glowing yellow spears flew into view, piercing the darkness and crashing into the ring of pellets, breaking it into pieces.

Looking at the spears lodged in the ground, Sans sighed in relief. "Of course you wait until the last possible second to show up."

"Of course! That's what heroes do!" came Undyne's response, though it had a subtle echo to it, as though there were two voices speaking at once.

Sans picked up on the echo and raised a nonexistent eyebrow. He looked at the spears again, processing their color. With a flash of realization, he turned around.

Undyne was standing there, surrounded in a yellow aura. Her armor was still black, but now seemed to shine with a pulsing rainbow. Her scales looked sturdier and tougher, metallic even. Behind her armor was a billowing cape with tassels at the end of it, which was a golden color. But most noticeable was her hair, which had gone from being red to a brilliant yellow, and it seemed to be floating on its own power.

Undyne had absorbed the Yellow Soul.

The face on the screen twisted into an angry one. "Hmph. I thought it was the King who absorbed that last one, but I guess it was you. Even still, you've only got one. I have the other six!"

Undyne cracked her knuckles. "Even without the Soul, I could take you on blindfolded!"

"Big whoop. You already have half of a blindfold."

"Oh, it is ON!"

Undyne's golden aura flared to life as she summoned four yellow spears around her, which all flew into the air, followed by her.

Vines erupted from the horrible abomination that were swatted aside by her spears. She was moving them with the power of her own Determination, and they were basically an extension of her as though she was wielding one normally.

She thrust one of the spears into the machine, but missed as Flowey retaliated by summoning missiles out of the darkness. Undyne dodged them easily too, even swatting one of them back towards Flowey.

Of course, Flowey still had the power of the Souls at his command, so the explosion it created didn't scratch him.

Undyne landed, looked up, and grimaced. "I've gotta get those Souls out of there somehow! There has to be a weakness somewhere… there has to be."

Sans looked up. He remembered the six Souls Flowey showed off before trying to finish him off.

"Undyne," he said, trying to be loud enough for her to hear but softly enough Flowey wouldn't. "Go for the left side of the screen up there. I think that's the weak link."

"How do you know that?"

"Going on a hunch."

"Well, it's not like I have any other ideas…"

She turned to face Flowey again, before Sans called her name again. "You didn't happen to see Alphys anywhere, did you?"

Undyne blinked. "Oh yeah. She's way off towards that direction." One of her spears pointed into the darkness. "I told her to stay put and I'd come back for her. Why?"

"I think I have a plan, and I might need her for it."

"I really hope you know what you're doing, Sans. But for now…" she turned back towards Flowey. "I've got a flower to yank the petals off of!"

And with that, she leaped into the air as Sans darted off into the darkness.

* * *

Spears collided with vines as Undyne moved swiftly around Flowey's new body, almost as though she was flying. She had to admit, she was absolutely LOVING this power. When this was over and this freak was taken care of, she'd talk Asgore into letting her take the other six and breaking the Barrier herself.

"You little pest!" Flowey shouted, clearly losing patience as none of his attacks seemed to connect with her new empowered state (Justice Mode, she decided to call it). "Do you really think you can hold out forever?!"

Undyne smirked. "Yep."

She leaped up towards him, and summoned multiple spears to swarm him, but when Flowey tried to shield himself with his vines, all the spears swarmed around to the left side of his monitor.

It cracked open, and out of it dropped one of the Souls. It was the pale red one.

"YES! Now, once I absorb this one, I'll be even tougher! ...huh?" she turned around, sensing a presence behind her.

In came Sans, running at top speed, holding a very disoriented Alphys by the claw. "Looks like I'm right on time!" Sans said.

"Wait, I'm still confused," Alphys interjected, catching her breath. "You haven't told me your plan!"

"Didn't have time. I'll fill you in in just one second."

With that, he looked directly at Frisk's soul and his eye began glowing as the pale red Soul turned a vibrant blue.

"Hey, Alphys! Catch!"

And Frisk's Soul, now blue, flew from Flowey, past Undyne, past Sans, and slammed itself into Alphys's chest, merging with her.

Undyne's eye widened. "You gave HER the Soul?!" she asked, flabbergasted. "She wouldn't know the first thing about fighting!"

"True," Sans replied, shrugging. Then he winked. "But now she might be able to get back to her lab."

Alphys didn't pick up on this, as she was undergoing a transformation of her own. She stood more upright and less slouched over, her labcoat turned from white to a glowing pink color, and her scales began to glow with a slight rainbow effect.

She stared down at her hands, getting a feel for her new power. "This…" Alphys stammered. "This feels AMAZING!"

"No time for that now," Sans was quick to interrupt. "Undyne! Keep that thing occupied!"

"No need to tell me twice!" Undyne responded, leaping back into the fray.

Sans turned back to Alphys, ignoring the explosions happening behind him. "You have the power of Determination now. You won't be able to Save or Load, not while the weed has the other souls. But theoretically, with two Souls away from him, you may be able to do a Partial Load."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Well, think of it this way: what is a Load?"

Alphys knew this one. "Theoretically, it's the power to exercise enough Determination to return to a previous location in space and time."

"You and Undyne both have one of his Souls. His control over the timestream may be less absolute. Therefore, you may be able to go to a previous point in space without altering time."

"But where would I…" suddenly, Alphys realized what Sans was asking. "The lab. The DT Extractor. You want me to…"

Sans nodded. "We can beat that freak and bring Frisk back at the same time. Then… she can take the timeline back to before this whole mess started."

Alphys nodded. "I'll see what I can do."

Sans chuckled. "I know I can count on you. Now, if you'll excuse me…"

He turned and ran towards the battle, summoning a couple Gaster Blasters to back Undyne up. Alphys looked back down at her hands.

"So this is the power of a Human Soul… I can feel it flowing through me. It's like nothing I've ever felt before.

"But how do I _use_ it?!"

* * *

 **Geez, sorry about the wait. It's almost over, I swear. Thanks for putting up with my writing for this long.**

 **I just want to give a shout-out to That-Typo-Was-Intentional real quick. Thanks for that review you left. It's comments like those that really motivate me to get writing. Same goes for everyone who's been sticking with me in spite of my subpar writing and eclectic schedule. We've only got one more chapter to go! Will I continue past that point? Probably, but most likely as a sequel and not more chapters to this story. Guess we'll have to wait and see.**


	9. Chapter 8: Closure

Alphys struggled to concentrate as the battle raged on in the distance. Sans was trying to use his Gaster Blasters to provide cover for Undyne as she, still empowered by the Yellow Soul she absorbed, pressed her assault on Flowey. Even though Flowey lost Frisk's Soul, there was still very little damage being done.

"Why isn't this working?" Alphys cried in frustration. "I know I have her Soul powering me. I know I have this power! Why can't I use it?"

Alphys clutched at her head, barely conscious of her own desperate ramblings. "It's just like everything else I do- a failure! I failed to break the Barrier, I failed those monsters I killed, and I failed to-"

Alphys blinked.

 _That's it._

 _THAT'S IT!_

 _Frisk was going through this same despair after all she had done. Of course her Determination wasn't up to snuff!_

She knew what she had to do.

"F-Frisk?" she asked herself. "Are you there? Well, of course you're there, you're, uh, inside me." Alphys chuckled nervously. "I really need to talk to you. I know you can hear me."

No answer. Just her own silent thoughts against the noise of the chaos erupting nearby.

"Please, Frisk! I want to help you!"

Still no answer.

Alphys crumpled to her knees.

"Frisk, I know you can hear me," Alphys said softly. "I know what it feels like to be in your shoes."

She didn't hear an answer, but she felt a strangely foreign and yet familiar feeling of skepticism.

"No, really. I made some… some horrible mistakes. I got monsters… not killed, but… something even worse, I think."

Alphys pauses to collect herself. Even if she was basically talking to herself, willing the words out of her mouth was more difficult than she anticipated.

But she pressed on. "The DT Extractor did some horrible things in my hands. But maybe now it can do some good. Kind of like you. I know you've made a worse mistake than me, but you have the power to be better!"

 _Why are you trying so hard to save me?_ came a child's voice from Alphys's subconscious, to her surprise. _After everything I've done to you?_

Alphys maintained her composure. She couldn't afford to choke now. "Because we believe in you, Frisk. Sans believes in you. Papyrus believes in you. _I_ believe in you!"

Now she was crying a little. She wasn't sure how much of it was herself and how much was Frisk. She closed her eyes.

"It's too late for me to fix my mistakes. I've dug myself too deep. But it's not too late for you. So please, Frisk. Help me figure this power out."

There was a palpable silence, so overwhelming even the battle seemed distant.

Alphys finally opened her eyes.

She was in her lab.

The Partial Load had worked.

She took an enormous sigh of relief. _Thank you, Frisk. I knew I could count on you._ And with that final thought, she grabbed her tool chest and got to work on the DT Extractor. As she did so, she felt the power from the Human Soul growing stronger.

Alphys was filled with determination.

* * *

Undyne lost track of how long she and Sans had been fighting. She never was one to give up, and the Yellow Soul was giving her an insane amount of stamina. She was still raring to go.

Unfortunately, so was Flowey, and she could tell Sans was out of it. His Gaster Blasters weren't as intense, and his dodging, though still top-notch, started to seem sluggish.

It was only a matter of time before fatigue got the better of him.

"What's wrong?" the smiling, laughing abomination crowed mockingly. "Getting tired? Why don't you call for help? Tag out?"

Flowey laughed. "No one can hear you two. No one can _help_ you. Not your pathetic king, and certainly not that incompetent loser you call a brother!"

Sans flinched. That was all it took for him to slip up and mess up his dodge, sending him falling onto the nonexistent floor.

" _Don't move."_

Flowey materialized several balls of Fire and hurled them all at Sans. The skeleton cursed at himself for his carelessness, and braced for the inevitable.

But it didn't come.

Undyne jumped in front of Sans, taking the blow. "GRRAAAAHHH!" she cried in pain. A normal fire wouldn't have phased her in this form, but it was five Souls against one. She was barely holding on now.

"You idiot," Flowey sneered, less irritated the killing blow has been blocked and more amused at her prolonging the inevitable. "So _noble_. I can see why you made Captain. You really deserve it, always wanting to protect everyone. _A lot of good that does you now."_

He formed another ring of spinning Friendliness Pellets around the exhausted skeleton and the injured fish lady.

"It's been fun. Now **DIE."**

He laughed maniacally as the ring closed in around them. Closer.. closer…

Until, one by one, they ran out of steam, stopped spinning, and dropped to the ground harmlessly.

"Wha-" Flowey started, flabbergasted. How could his attack have failed?

And more importantly, why did it feel like he was leaking?

Flowey's computer face turned around, and his annoyed confusion turned to sheer terror.

"No… not that! OF ALL THINGS, WHY THAT?!"

He was now face to face with the skull-like apparatus of the DT Extractor. It was much more compact, no longer a permanent fixture if the lab. The horrid device had been reworked to travel on wheels, almost like a tank, or one of those medieval catapults, and at the back, sitting in a makeshift cockpit, hand at a control panel, was Alphys.

The machine was turned on, absorbing the Determination from his Human Souls and transferring it into Alphys. Or rather, the Soul within her.

"What did you do?!"

Alphys smirked. "I modified the Extractor to be a mounted weapon on wheels. I thought it would take longer, but it turns out that when you've got a Human Soul inside of you, you tend to get things done quicker."

"Y-you think you can win?" cried Flowey. "I'll just load, and…"

And nothing happened.

"Sorry, Flowey, but you've lost too much power to do that." Alphys glared at him, somehow managing to look intimidating, perhaps due to her transformation. "It's time to finally end this!"

Alphys pulled a lever on the control panel, and the rate at which it drained the energy from Flower increased dramatically.

"NO!" Flowey yelled as the power of his Human Souls finally started to die out. "THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING! NO! NOOOOOOO!"

There was a blinding white flash. And then silence.

* * *

The next thing everyone knew, they were lying in a garden of golden flowers.

They were wide awake and their injuries had healed, as though the whole fight never happened.

Undyne still had her golden transformation, but Alphys had reverted to normal. Sans didn't change, as he hadn't absorbed anything in the first place.

"Where are we right now?" Alphys asked no one in particular.

Undyne took in her surroundings. Around the bed of flowers, there were stone walls, a light shining down onto the flowers, what appeared to be a stained glass window in the back…

…and a throne.

"We're… we're in the King's garden!" Undyne realized. That's when she noticed one more occupant of the room.

At the very center of the garden was a flower, larger than the rest, with a face. It was dropped over, wilting.

Undyne's one eye narrowed. " _You._ "

She summoned one of her spears and prepared to thrust it at the offending plant, and was about to throw it when-

"No. Don't."

Everyone turned in surprise towards the source of that quiet, gentle, yet firm voice.

There, as alive as you are right now, was Frisk, in her striped sweater and cargo shorts. She was standing taller, with more certainty. Her eyes were neutral, with no visible signs of anger or even sadness.

"He won't hurt anyone else, ever again. No one else has to die today."

Undyne glared at her, then back at the flower. The three of them stood there silently for the longest time.

Then, from behind the door at the back of the room, came another sound.

"Hello? Is someone there?"

It was deep, powerful, and yet inviting and friendly. The flower flinched, and dove under the ground.

The door opened, and in walked King Asgore, with his imposing figure, large, regal robe, and snow-white fur with a yellow beard.

"I was by the Barrier, when I saw that someone had taken the Human Souls. I was trying to figure out what happened when I heard a commotion coming from the throne room. Is everything okay?"

The assembled group- Undyne, Alphys, Sans, and Frisk- were dumbstruck. _Did he seriously miss that entire thing?!_ He didn't even seem to notice Undyne's transformation.

"It's a long story, Your Majesty," Undyne responded. "A lot happened, and I may have absorbed one of the Souls. But I'll explain everything later. For now…" she shoved Frisk towards the king, catching her off guard. "You get to talk to Asgore. Lucky you. Better make it count."

Undyne's tone did not lose any of her earlier hostility. Frisk looked up at her and, against all logic, she smiled.

"Don't worry. This won't take long. And when I'm done…" Frisk turned to look at Alphys, and winked to reassure her. "We can do what should have been done a long time ago."

Frisk turned back towards Asgore, took a few steps, and bowed.

"Uh…" Asgore started, "you really don't have to bow."

"Of course," Frisk said as she straightened back up. "My name is Frisk, and I'm the Human who killed everyone in Snowdin." She looked in Asgore's eyes as she said this. No reaction.

"I just wanted to say a few things. First, I'm sorry. I know that isn't worth that much, and I don't expect you to forgive me, but I just wanted to get that out there."

Frisk took a deep breath. "Second, I was _going_ to ask you to give Humans a chance when you get to the surface," she continued, smiling sadly, "but something tells me that would sound a bit hollow after what I've done."

She took a step closer and lowered her voice so the others couldn't hear her as clearly. "But truth be told, I don't think you really want to get revenge on the humans as badly as you say. You could've crossed the Barrier before, when you only had one soul and started killing us, but you decided to stick with your people and give them hope instead."

Asgore's expression seemed to waver a bit. Frisk continued. "Maybe that's why, anyway. Maybe it was just cowardice. I don't really know. But right now that doesn't really matter. But I think, deep down, you're not a killer."

Without waiting for a reply, she backed up a bit and began talking normally. "I don't know what exactly happened to the other Souls. So you'll have to start with just two again. But…" she closed her eyes. "I think you'll be just fine."

She turned back around to face the others, opening her eyes. "Everyone!"

Frisk smiled and held up a hand, almost like a wave goodbye. "See you all later."

And then she woke up three days earlier on another bed of flowers.

* * *

 **It's over. This whole exercise, born from my inability to leave well enough alone, has finally reached its conclusion. I'm sorry I updated so** **sporadically this past half a year or so, but hopefully it was all worth it.**

 **This was the first multi-chapter fanfic I ever finished writing. Hopefully my writing improves on it, but I think this turned out all right.**

 **Thank you all for sticking with me, and for those of you who are only reading this after it's finished, thanks for reading.**


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